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Eminent Victorians by Lytton Strachey (1918)

Almost a century after its publication, Lytton Strachey’s Eminent Victorians remains a landmark work in the field of biography. The author chooses four notable personalities – Henry Manning, Florence Nightingale, Thomas Arnold, and Charles George Gordon – and uses their lives to illuminate the broader history of Victorian England. Unlike previous biographers of the time, Strachey consciously rejects romanticized images of these figures. Instead, he presents the facts of their lives “dispassionately, impartially, and without ulterior intentions.” These mythic characters take on human proportions and they prove all the more interesting for their ambition, pettiness, hypocrisy, and peculiarity. Cardinal Manning, the leader of the Catholic Church in England, becomes a merciless if conflicted self-promoter. The Crimean War nurse Nightingale is a hard-bitten health advocate haunted by memories of dying young men. Arnold appears less the champion of public school reform than an intellectual theocrat. Finally, Strachey calls into question the heroism of General Gordon’s death during the Mahdist Revolt in the Sudan; far from seeming a great strategist, the military commander parades across the pages as a tempestuous zealot, “a fighter, an enthusiast, a bold adventurer.” Strachey’s critical accounts shocked his Edwardian audience, but contemporary readers will find them fascinating for their candid portrayals of the eccentricities and passions that motivated four remarkable figures.

The brief biographical sketches also offer glimpses into the history of the era. The Oxford Movement’s introduction of ritual and ceremony into the Anglican tradition frames Manning’s conversion to Catholicism, while Gordon represents a microcosm of European imperialism in Africa and Asia. The remaining subjects provide Strachey with the opportunity to investigate restrictive upper-class mores and the evolution of reform movements in British society. The interactions of these four distinguished Victorians with characters like the influential theologian John Henry Newman and Prime Minister William Gladstone go still further and elevate the biographies to the level of high politics. As such, the author provides an accessible narrative that emphasizes the role of individuals in shaping the recent history of Great Britain.

Strachey’s book heralded a new age of biographical study, but his fluid prose and charming style account for the work’s ability to transcend its time and still speak to us today.

More detailed and scandalous investigations of nineteenth century Britain and its most famous citizens have since appeared, and many delve deeper into the historical record than does Eminent Victorians, which relies almost exclusively on earlier histories and collected letters. Yet Strachey’s vivid prose, artless erudition, and eye for detail move the stories along at a fast pace, simultaneously educating and entertaining in equal doses. A somewhat sardonic tone pervades the book, but the critical distance and the wry allusions recall the feeling of a conversation with an especially learned friend. As much a literary experience as a lesson in history, Strachey’s Eminent Victorians continues to attract new readers simply because it offers such a pleasurable and increasingly rare integration of scholarship, writing, and wit.

Portrait of Lytton Strachey by Dora Carrington, via Wikicommons

The Culture of Time and Space, 1880-1918 by Stephen Kern (2003)

by Julia Rahe

The modern individual, living in an era of high-speed technology, international travel and an increasingly worldwide community, may be surprised to learn that there have not always been only four time zones in the continental United States, or that there existed a era when having one’s picture taken was an anomalous, threatening experience. Stephen Kern’s fascinating book, The Culture of Time and Space, investigates these and other radical changes that occurred in people’s temporal and spatial reality at the turn of the twentieth century. Kern calls time and space the universal, “essential” realities through which humans perceive, experience and live life, and he uses them to understand historical change.

According to Kern, the forty years between 1880 and 1918 were a period of unprecedented cultural renovation and refiguring, when changes in perceptions of speed, space, form, distance and direction broke down traditional hierarchies and reconstructed conventional values and understandings. The proliferation of technological advances such as the telephone and the telegraph altered perceptions of time by allowing individuals in one place to experience simultaneous events in another for the first time. The result was a “thickening” of the present as events occurring in different places convened in a single moment. At the same time, advances in transportation created a “cult of speed,” as bicycles, trams and railroads allowed people to travel at faster velocities than ever before.

‘What hath God wrought’?: a map showing the global reach of the Eastern Telegraph Co. System, 1901.

While technological advances altered traditional understanding of time, cultural trends in art and philosophy challenged classical perceptions of space. New artistic movements such as Impressionism and Cubism broke down the illusion of three-dimensional space displayed on the two-dimensional canvas by presenting multiple perspectives to the viewer. These multiple points of view reflected the growing pluralism and confusion of the modern age. New philosophical trends such as Perspectivism also supported ideas about plurality and the subjectivity of personal experience by challenging the notion of an absolute, homogeneous reality.

New art movements such as Futurism, Cubism and Dadaism challenged old notions of perspective and drew inspiration from modern technologies such as the telegraph, the radio and the airplane. This detail from Umberto Boccioni‘s 1911 painting The Noise of the Street Enters the House exemplifies the frenetic energy of this new aesthetics based on speed, urbanism and technological prowess.

Through the juxtaposition of seemingly unrelated cultural and scientific phenomena, Kern successfully draws conclusions about broader social changes occurring across Europe and the United States at the turn of the twentieth century. The Culture of Time and Space is a captivating read for a wide audience. Kern’s broad and sweeping, yet detailed, discussion of new trends in art, philosophy and architecture will thrill lovers of material culture, and science and technology buffs will lose themselves in Kern’s explanation of the profound impact of new technological advances on individuals’ perceptions of the world.

All images in this review were published on Wikimedia Commons under a GNU free documentation license.

The Voices of Morebath: Reformation and Rebellion in an English Village by Eamon Duffy (2001)

by Michelle Brock

The Voices of Morebath chronicles the coming of the English Reformation to a small village in sixteenth-century Devonshire. Duffy tells the story of Morebath through the eyes of its boisterous vicar, Sir Christopher Trychay, who kept exceptionally detailed records during his fifty-four year career in the village. His churchwarden’s accounts are laden with personal commentary, providing a unique window into the lives of ordinary men and women during the years of the English Reformation, when the Church of England first broke away from the Catholic Church in Rome. Though titled the Voices of Morebath, the voice of Sir Christopher Trychay, with all his opinions and biases, dominates the work; The Voices of Morebath is ultimately his story.

The book begins with images of present-day Morebath and a fascinating account of the land, the people and the economy of the village during the sixteenth-century. Details about the collective religious life of Morebath, with deeply-rooted devotional practices centered on saints, the Parish church, and liturgy provide a broader context for the main story. When the Reformation came to Morebath in the 1540’s, the villagers reluctantly moved towards Protestantism. Through the words of Trychay, Duffy traces how the people of Morebath struggled to reconcile their commitment to traditional faith with the new religious policies under Henry VIII and his children, a struggle that, at times, resulted in dramatic rebellion. The most striking aspect of this story is the active role played by the people of Morebath, who consistently made their own choices about the religious changes occurring in their world. We also see how the Reformation brought great change to the economic and social life of Morebath, as Elizabethan taxation and military policies began to shift the villagers’ focus away from the parish church to more worldly matters.

In his earlier and larger work, The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400–1580 (Yale, 1992), Duffy persuasively refutes the claims that late medieval Catholicism was static and moribund and that the Protestant Reformation ushered in a welcome move towards modernity. He contends, rather, that pre-Reformation English Catholicism was a vibrant cultural staple and Protestantism arrived as an unwelcome, destabilizing, and even destructive force. In the village of Morebath, Duffy tests this thesis with convincing results. Prior to the Reformation, people in Morebath showered their parish church with gifts and bequeathed family heirlooms to a local saint, showing their devotion to a faith that informed their community identity. Duffy contends that following the Reformation, the unifying force of Catholicism was lost. While many in Morebath quietly accepted the changes wrought by Protestantism, not everyone stayed silent. In a fascinating chapter, Duffy describes a key moment of revolt, when the village sent five men to join a rebellion against the Protestant King Edward.

Not all villages in England followed the patterns found in Morebath. Nonetheless, Sir Christopher Trychay provides an authentic voice of the early modern world, providing insight into a place far removed from our own. The Voices of Morebath is a compelling and accessible microhistory with broader historical implications.

Foucault’s Pendulum by Umberto Eco (1988)

by David A. Conrad

Three brilliant but frustrated editors amuse themselves by inventing European history anew in Umberto Eco’s bestselling novel, Foucault’s Pendulum. The protagonists rearrange names both familiar and obscure from a millennium of European politics, religion, and science to create a dizzying alternative narrative of Templar plots, secret society schemes, and occultist conspiracies. Eco’s book is deeper and intellectually richer than Dan Brown’s subsequent variations on the same theme, but it is also every bit as thrilling. It takes readers on a journey through time as well as across beautifully detailed spaces from Italy and France to Brazil.

The novel’s heroes are middle-aged Milanese academics. By day they toil in the stifling atmosphere of a vanity publishing press, but by night they sip cocktails and exchange esoteric banter about medieval history. As they creatively re-imagine Europe’s journey from the Crusades to the Enlightenment, they battle their personal demons of career, faith, and love. Soon they are battling for their lives against mysterious forces that bear a startling resemblance to their ostensibly fictional fantasies.

Eco’s prose, translated from Italian by William Weaver, is high-minded, witty, and deeply researched. The book’s Byzantine plot touches on everything from the workings of the publishing industry to the mechanics of the eponymous pendulum, a nineteenth-century scientific curiosity that demonstrates the Earth’s rotation. Foucault’s Pendulum is much denser than the novels of Eco imitator Dan Brown, and many will find it a more rewarding read as a result. Its juxtaposition of realistic characters and fantastic imagery will linger with readers long after the climactic revelations.

A Tale of Two Murders: Passion and Power in Seventeenth-Century France by James Farr (2005)

by Julia M. Gossard

With all of the components of a riveting murder-mystery, including a baffling disappearance, a set of gossipy characters, a love triangle, conflicting evidence, and a scandalous trial, A Tale of Two Murders: Passion and Power in Seventeenth-Century France by James R. Farr is a fascinating read. Farr chronicles the investigation and subsequent trial of Philippe Giroux, a wealthy nobleman in Dijon. The trial enthralled Dijon’s inhabitants and the whole of French noble society from 1639 to 1642.

In the growing city of Dijon, France on September 6, 1638 Pierre Baillet and his valet, La Valeur went missing. Immediately after learning of the men’s disappearance, maidservants, apprentices, shopkeepers, and other workers began to gossip in the streets about what had happened to Baillet and La Valeur. Some argued Baillet simply left town unexpectedly while others spread more sinister rumors of foul play and murder. After six months of petty gossip a formal investigation finally began. Soon Jean-Baptiste Lantin, the investigation’s leader, found a primary suspect: Philippe Giroux, Baillet’s first cousin. As a président of the Burgundy Parlement, Giroux was a powerful and prominent member of society. However, when it became known that Giroux was involved in a passionate and secret affair with Baillet’s beautiful wife, Marie Fyot, and that Baillet and La Valeur had dined at Giroux’s house on the night of their disappearance, Giroux became the focus of Lantin’s investigation. News of Giroux’s arrest sent shockwaves through the community, creating another firestorm of gossip and speculation that greatly influenced the course of the subsequent trial.

In addition to providing a captivating narrative, A Tale of Two Murders investigates the ways in which power, justice, law, and society all intersected and, at times, conflicted with one another in seventeenth-century France. Farr shows the conflicts between the formal powers of the judicial system and the informal powers of the nobility’s patronage networks and sketches in the community’s role as both witness and arbitrator. Informal institutions were paramount in determining not only which cases went to trial, but also the outcomes of those trials. A defendant’s reputation, as determined by the community, was of utmost importance in establishing whether or not an individual was capable of committing a certain crime. The judicial system in early modern France was a complex institution that favored those at the top of society. Vast patronage networks protected the nobility, making it very difficult for people to bring accusations against the nobility in court. But these patronage networks were not indestructible as the community could work to destroy an individual’s reputation by spreading rumors and accusations of particularly heinous acts.

A Tale of Two Murders produces a vivid illustration of the early modern French legal system, power dynamics, and society while providing the reader with a spellbinding story of mystery, gossip, love, lies, deceit, and murder. Readers who enjoy murder-mysteries will surely find Farr’s A Tale of Two Murders a captivating and informative read.

A Medieval Vision

by Martha G. Newman

In the last years of the twelfth-century, a monk named Engelhard, from the German monastery of Langheim, composed stories about miraculous events and visions he believed his fellow monks had experienced. This was not a decision made lightly: parchment was expensive, the process of writing laborious, and monastic authors needed permission from their superiors to write at all. But Engelhard (and his abbot) considered this project worthwhile. His stories preserved memories of holy monks, celebrated the special sanctity of his monastic order, and encouraged proper behavior. Other monks must have found this collection of stories worthwhile. Over the next century, it was copied – still by hand, still on parchment – at least four times.

A Cistercian manuscript of Gregory the Great's Moral Commentary on Job, created around 1111. A monk is seen wielding an ax, and the tree has some marks near the base. The monks and the tree form the letter "I." — A Cistercian manuscript of Gregory the Great’s *Moral Commentary on Job*, created around 1111. Today it is in the municipal library in Dijon, France (ms 173). The monks and the tree form the letter “I.”

The historical text I present here is one of Engelhard’s monastic stories. I have transcribed it from an early thirteenth-century manuscript and translated it from Latin into English. It contains a striking and unusual image: an apparition of the Virgin holding a vase filled with the sweat she had collected from monks laboring in fields. The image reinforces the purpose of Engelhard’s collection, for Mary praised the monks’ work and the holiness of their monastery; after hearing the story of the vision, Engelhard claimed that the monks worked still harder. However, this story does more than exhort and praise these Cistercian monks. It also illustrates changing attitudes toward labor as Europe moved from a subsistence to a commercial economy.

Engelhard was a monk in the Cistercian order. The first Cistercian monastery was founded in 1098, the same year that the crusaders conquered the city of Jerusalem. Just as the First Crusade demonstrated the combination of technological and economic advances and new religious impulses that allowed Europe to go on the offensive, so the growth of the Cistercian order in the twelfth century also combined a new understanding of religious ideas with technological and economic innovations. These monks sought to follow, as closely as possible, the strictures of the monastic rule written by St. Benedict 600 years earlier. One result of their adherence to the Benedictine Rule was that they rejected the economic practices of their monastic contemporaries, most of whom lived off the labor of a subject peasantry. The Cistercians instead wanted to live off their own labor; they refused gifts of manors and peasant revenues and, as a result, accumulated pasture, waste, and other territory not already settled by peasants. As the monks cleared these lands, raised sheep and pigs, and created workshops for metallurgy and other crafts, they quickly became participants in a new commercial and money-based economy.

The Cistercians’ attitudes toward work did not change as quickly as their economic practices. Medieval society inherited two sets of ideas about work, both of which held work in low esteem. The classical tradition of ancient Greek and Rome valued a cultured leisure and disdained the labor of those who made this cultured leisure possible. The early Christian interpretation of Genesis emphasized that God condemned Adam and Eve to toil and pain and presented labor as a result of human sinfulness. Throughout much of the middle ages, peasants were often seen as cursed by God because they had to labor in order to survive. When the Cistercians monks included agricultural work in their monastic customs, many of their contemporaries were puzzled to see aristocratic men working as peasants: “How, truly, is it religion to dig the ground, to cut down trees, to haul manure?” critics asked.

Even the early Cistercians still viewed labor as a penance for sin. They saw their willingness to take on the work of peasants as teaching them humility and control over their bodies: work was a means of imitating the humility and suffering of Christ, not a way to produce goods for consumption and sale. Soon after the foundation of their order, the Cistercians recognized that it was difficult to combine their prescribed hours of prayer with the demands of an agricultural economy; they may also have realized that aristocratic monks were not skilled at tending sheep and harvesting grain. As a result, they formed a second group of monks within their communities. These “laybrothers” spent less time at prayer and more at work, and they were probably responsible for the economic success of many Cistercian communities.

Engelhard was not the only Cistercian to tell a story about an apparition of the Virgin Mary who encouraged Cistercian labor. There are versions in other Cistercian story collections, but these depict Mary visiting the monks while they are at work, and they emphasize the wonder of seeing such noble men toiling as peasants in the fields. They emphasize labor as a form of penance which has a spiritual value only if it has been chosen voluntarily. Engelhard’s story is different, and suggests a changing attitude toward work. The monk in his story was the cellerar – the official in charge of the laybrothers, of paying hired workers, and generally maintaining the economic well-being of the monastery. And, in Engelhard’s version, this cellerar asks the apparition whether work done out of necessity has the same spiritual value as that done voluntarily. Mary’s response is remarkable: she says that she values both forms of labor and both will receive a reward.

Engelhard’s story suggests a growing recognition of the economic value of work. His ideas are akin to those of other late twelfth-century authors who rejected the idea that those who toiled out of economic necessity were cursed by God, who began to value the involuntary labor of peasants, and who started to quantify both time and production. We are not yet observing a society in which goods are valued primarily by their market worth: Engelhard’s story depicts monks producing sweat for Mary to collect rather than commodities to sell. But Engelard’s story of a monastic vision demonstrates that European attitudes toward work had started to change in tandem with the rise of a new commercial economy in the high middle ages.

The grange of the monastery of Langheim. Plants at the forefront of the image are decorated with gold and purple ribbons. — The grange (barn and workshops) of the monastery of Langheim. Today, the remaining buildings from Langheim are part of the town of Lichtenfels, in Upper Franconia, Germany.

A Monk’s Vision of the Virgin Mary (translated by Martha G. Newman)

This event happened in a monastery of our order, in a monastery that is renowned throughout France. Everyone believes it, because the man who saw it has many witnesses to his testimony.

It was harvest time, and as the monks worked in the fields, they sweat heavily with the hard work and under the heat of the day. When evening came, they went to bed and closed the door to their dormitory. The cellarer was a holy man, wise and mature, and of such good character that he alone was allowed to remain outside to take care of the hired workers. When he was finished, he went in to go to sleep, but the door to the dormitory was closed. What should he do? Beat on the door? He was not willing to knock, because the monks were resting. Should he then leave? But then he himself would have no rest. Preferring to inconvenience himself rather than his brothers, he entered the chapter room and sat on the steps.

But he did not sleep, and behold! the young woman entered, her light preceding two other women, and she approached the monk and asked if he slept.

He responded that he was awake, but asked why, against all monastic custom and in the middle of the night, the women entered the monastery without a care.

The woman said, “I am Mary, who cares for all who are in this abbey and in this order.” She carried a glass vase, which she held to her nose as if capturing the smell from it. And she said, “ I have visited today my monks in the field, and I collected their sweat for myself in this vase. For me it is the most pleasant smell, and it is certainly worthy for my Son, and it will return the highest reward.

The monk then asked, “O holy Lady, how important is our labor for you which is not so much done from voluntary devotion as from the necessity of our poverty?”

And she answered, “What do you say? Have you not heard that what is voluntary receives a penalty and duty earns the reward? If duty receives the reward, what is voluntary now receives a part. But whether out of necessity or voluntary, what you do is mine. I claim all of your work for myself, and what I receive, I remunerate.”

Having said this, she disappeared, and the monk slept sweetly, thus refreshed in hope, comforted in faith, and willing to work.

When morning came, he joyfully and devotedly reported what he had seen to the abbot at the chapter meeting. All were joyful, all believed him, and no one doubted it because of the seriousness of his character. All were stirred up, each was aroused to work. They labored and they sweated in such a manner that Mary, as she came near, could fill up her vase.

And thus Mary was accustomed to sport sweetly with her sons; thus she showed herself in a vision to them, offering them the gift of peace and grace. Those who were meek heard and rejoiced, those who were discouraged heard and were comforted; the lazy were inspired; all ran easily and without exhaustion to give glory to Christ and Mary, and from them receiving grace.

From Engelhard of Langheim’s Miracle Book. Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, clm 13097, ff. 145v-146r.

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